


Rings

by angelsandbrowncoats



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Cage!Fic, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Pre-Fall, fledgling!lucifer, mostly angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-04
Updated: 2014-08-04
Packaged: 2018-02-11 17:13:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2076306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelsandbrowncoats/pseuds/angelsandbrowncoats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Long before the creation of the Earth, Michael and Lucifer make rings for each other. They're sure they'll have them forever, just like they'll have each other forever. </p><p>And then the humans arrive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rings

**Author's Note:**

> I've been writing so much fluff lately, I needed a little angst. But I'm still a sucker for happy endings.
> 
> Also, this is unbeta'd and I wrote it relatively quickly, so sorry for any mistakes or poor characterization

“Hey, Luce. I have something for you,” Michael touched down lightly just behind his brother after a long day of flying expeditions. Lucifer spun around, hiding something behind his back, he looked up at Michael, eyes wide, “So do I, actually. For you.”

Michael smiled down at him. Lucifer was so bright and always curious-it was difficult to be anything but joyous around him. The universe had been dark and empty before his creation, and Michael never wanted to see that again. So he held out his hand for Lucifer’s and flew with the younger archangel to an isolated garden.

“What did you get for me?” he asked, sitting down on the grass and pulling Lucifer into his lap. Lucifer shook his head, “You first.”

“Okay. I made this while we were out today. The stars are very helpful when it comes to this stuff. It’s only gold and silver, but the gem in the middle is a red diamond,” he pulled a ring out of his pocket, star shaped with runes engraved in it. On the inside of the band were the words ‘ _To my Morningstar, From your prince_ ’ in enochian.

Lucifer took it from him carefully and slid it onto his ring finger, “What do they mean?”

“The runes are of joy and power. The shape, well, _Morningstar_ , what do you think?”

He shifted so he could wrap his arms around Michael, “Thank you. I love it.”

Michael returned the hug before moving back just a little, “Alright, Luca. I went first. Your turn.” Lucifer looked down nervously as he showed Michael what he’d hidden earlier. It was another ring, with a silver band and a blue sapphire carved into an intricate pattern, almost like a crown. On the inside of it he had engraved ‘ _Micha & Luca_’, also in enochian. The gem seemed to glow in a pale light, like an extremely weak imitation or reflection of his brother.

The eldest archangel stared at it, “Lucifer, that’s beautiful.”

“Really?” the younger looked back up at him, happiness radiating off of him.

“Of course,” he reassured, taking it and mimicking Lucifer’s previous action. When he finished admiring it on his hand, he leaned over and kissed Lucifer on the top of his head, running his fingers through his hair, “And so are you.”

Lucifer snuggled closer in his arms, “Not as much as you.”

“I’m afraid I have to disagree. You’ve been the most enchanting being in existence since Father created you. And I don’t think that’s ever going to change.”

 

~                             ~                                   ~

 

“Michael! How could you?” Lucifer screamed at his older brother the second they landed on the empty planet. Michael refused to meet his eyes, “I should be asking you that. Orders are orders. We’re not supposed to disobey Father. You know that, so why did you?”

“But… he’s wrong! Can’t you see that?”

“Father is always right.”

“ _Why?!_ What makes him right?” still shouting, he angrily wiped away a tear while trying to hold the rest back, “It doesn’t make any sense, Michael!”

“Everything happens because Father says so. That’s how it’s always been. That’s how it always will be. He knows everything, past, present, and future,” Michael quoted. Lucifer glared at him, voice softening to almost a whisper, “So he knew all along that this was going to happen? Did he tell you? I bet he did. Is that why you were always so nice to me? Did you pity me?”

“Lucifer-”

“I don’t want to hear it. Leave me alone, Michael.”

The older stepped forward, arm outstretched, but Lucifer was already gone. Michael turned to leave when a glint of light caught his eye. Turning back, he crouched down. Where Lucifer had been standing sat a ring. A star-shaped ring with a red diamond in the middle.

Michael picked it up and closed his eyes. There had been a third rune on it. He hadn’t told Lucifer about it because he wasn’t sure they younger would understand. He’d only been a fledgling, after all. The intent has always been to tell him when Michael knew he was ready. Because Michael _knew_ he and Lucifer had been destined to spend eternity together.

Now he glared at the rune of fate and wanted nothing more to scratch it out of the gold it was carved in. How could Lucifer possibly think he was nice to him because he _pitied_ him? Wasn’t his love of the other obvious? Of course Michael hadn’t known. If he had, he would have found a way to stop his brother beforehand, or he would have done it first, just so Lucifer wouldn’t have to. And if he didn’t want the ring anymore, did it mean that Lucifer didn’t love him anymore? Had he ever? Yesterday Michael would have sworn up and down that he did. Today, he wasn’t so sure.

 

~                                    ~                              ~

 

The worst part of it was his eyes. They were so empty. So resigned. So cold. As Michael looked down at his brother, he couldn’t see the brightness anymore. And it didn’t feel like Michael was the one standing over the other.

Lucifer just knelt there, Michael’s flaming sword at his throat, staring up at him. He didn’t even seem angry. He seemed dead.

“Do it now, _brother_. Wouldn’t want to make this any longer for you than it has to be,” and since when was Lucifer sarcastic? Since when was he cynical? It seemed like mere moments ago he’d been fascinated by anything and everything. Michael wanted to look away. He wanted to hold Lucifer and ask him what happened. But he _knew_ what happened. Michael had happened. And now he realized how much worse everything was for his brother, just because he’d indulged his love for him. Michael was the viceroy. He was the leader. He wasn’t allowed indulgences. He wasn’t allowed love. If he tried, people got hurt. And now it was the one person he cared about more than any other-the one he’d sworn to protect. If only he’d treated Lucifer like a soldier from the start, maybe his brother might still be here, on this field, but he might still shine with that supposedly unquenchable light.

“I’m sorry, Luca,” it had been ages since he’d called his brother that. Not since the humans, certainly. Probably even before that. Michael had gotten busy, and he’d had so little time for Lucifer.

And then the pit to hell-to the cage-was opened, directly behind Lucifer. His brother looked one last time at him, before saying, “You’re just cruel Michael. Making me look at you for so long before letting me leave. What? Wanted to make sure I remembered the face of my betrayer perfectly? Well I will, and believe you me, I’ll be ready to kill you the next time we meet.”

Before Michael could say a word or move, Lucifer had twisted to his feet and leapt over the edge, straight into hell. Michael ran up to the edge, watching his brother fall, the tears openly streaming down his face now.

When he could no longer see him, he moved to close the pit but paused. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out the ring he’d given Lucifer.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, “I never wanted this.”

Then he dropped it over the edge too, “It will always be yours.”

 

~                                  ~                                  ~

 

Lucifer cursed his brother the moment he heard the metal ping against the hot stone floor of the cage. The floor was scalding, but the walls had actual lava pouring down them. Better to stay in the center. He was an archangel. He’d adapt eventually.

It was about a century of Hell time before Lucifer picked up the ring. It would have scorched the flesh of a human. Not him. He wished it did.

Every century or so he rotated between holding the ring close, thinking about all the times he and Michael had shared together and he knew he couldn’t claim Michael had been false. No one had ever been truer than Michael to Lucifer. Then he’d recall everything Michael had done that led up to the fall and he threw the ring at the walls again, trying to get as far away from it as possible.

But it always bounced off the walls straight towards him.

Then one day he figured out what he wanted to do with it. Approaching the walls of the cage, Lucifer noted idly that they were no longer that uncomfortable to be around. He observed just how cold he was becoming.

Holding the ring to the wall, he watched intensely as it slowly melted. Anything made by an archangel could withstand a lot of damage, but this was hell.

Once it was as hot as it could get without losing form, Lucifer melded it into his skin, the diamond embedding right over his heart. It was the same day that he decided he had lied for the first time in his existence. He would never be ready to kill Michael.

 

~                                           ~                                              ~

 

When Michael returned to Heaven from the field, there was a feast in full swing.There were minstrels singing to the celebrating crowds, playing fanfares on trumpets and songs of love on harps. Michael tried his best to block it out. How could they play music when the angel of music was gone?

Everywhere he looked, angels were trying to congratulate him. For what? For destroying his brother? For realizing just how harmful love was? Instead of voicing his thoughts, Michael forced a smile on his face and hid his eyes so no one could see the whirlwind of anger, loss, and pain in them. He knew they wouldn’t understand. He’d just conquered the Adversary after all.

Raphael knew. She always knew. But there was nothing she could say. She knew that too. So she let him be, knowing that the same sense of duty that let him betray his brother would bring him back to them. It would be in vain otherwise.

Gabriel might have known too, but he was gone. He left when they’d first started to fight. Michael wished he had the courage to do that. He wished with all his being that he could disobey his father. _But it’s not possible_. God must have wanted Gabriel to leave. But Michael couldn’t have. Michael had a job to do.

He took to fiddling with the ring Lucifer had given him. Partially so that he never had to take it off and see ‘ _Micha & Luca_’ again. It had been even longer than he had called Lucifer Luca that his brother had called him Micha. They’d grown apart without him realizing it, and that was the worst.

Had they never been close, it would have been okay. It even would have been better if they’d known long enough to spend every last second together. Instead he’d spent the last few years of Lucifer loving him telling him, ‘In a minute, Luce.’

A few centuries later, Zachariah asked why he still kept anything from somebody evil. Naomi overheard and made it her personal mission to get Michael to get rid of the ring. She claimed it impaired his thinking ability. Michael wondered where he’d lost control of his own army-since when did they order him about?

But he wasn’t about to give up that ring for anyone or anything. So he put it on a chain and hid it under the layers of clothes and armor he wore every day. He brought it out and held it, just staring at its faint glow every night. This was all that was left of his little brother’s brightness.

 

~                                      ~                                   ~

 

The encounter in the cemetery hadn’t gone the way either of them had expected. They certainly hadn’t expected the Winchesters to get the upper hand, or to end up in the cage. But now they were here, back in their last vessels, Nick and John from the past. Sam and Adam were trying not to touch any piece of the cage in one corner. Sam held Adam up, taking most of the burning himself, partially because he felt responsible that the younger boy was in here, partially because Adam was only on and off conscious. His lack of control at the time Michael had been forcibly removed from his body had taken a toll.

Lucifer could tell Michael felt the heat of the cage like he had when he’d first landed, but he was hiding it well. They circled each other, both waiting for the other to make the first move, be it peaceful or threatening.

Michael noticed it then. He’d been distracted at the cemetery, but now he noticed it. The ring was nowhere to be seen. He moved first.

“So you really didn’t want it?”

Lucifer raised an eyebrow, unwilling to respond to a question he was clearly unsure of. So Michael specified, “The ring. I threw it in after you. It’s yours.”

“What about the ring?”

“You don’t have it. I don’t see it, but who knows what you could have done to it down here.”

Lucifer snorted, “You’re one to talk: I don’t see yours anywhere, either.” Michael stopped short. He stared at Lucifer incredulously, “You think I could get rid of that? I wanted to forget you so bad, but there was nothing I could do. I can’t. You’re everything to me. You were the only thing I ever had that wasn’t an order.”

He pulled the chain out from where it was still hidden under his vessel’s clothes, “I’ve always had it with me. Since the day you gave it to me. You’re the one who threw yours away.”

 _“Because you betrayed me-_ ”

“Luce, please, just tell me what you did with it. I swear, I’m sorry. I just… I just always thought we’d have them til the end. It was the first thing I ever made, and I made it specifically for you. I just want to know what happened to it.”

He was taken aback when Lucifer laughed. It was a hollow sort of laugh-the laugh of a madman who is actually sane but lives in such an impossible situation that he seems insane. A madman aware of everything around him. Without hesitating another beat, Lucifer tore his vessel’s shirt, revealing the metal now merged with his vessel’s skin. The diamond was still embedded. Even the rune engravings were still there, and he’d curved the bottom of the ring so that the enochian words were still visible, like a banner under the star.

“I discovered what the third rune means, brother.”

 

~                                    ~                                              ~

 

Michael had stared at Lucifer for a long while after seeing what he’d done with the ring. Sam seemed to be in shock, too, and perhaps confusion, but he had enough sense to keep his mouth shut.

Hours, weeks, years later-Michael didn’t know- he blinked slowly and backed away from Lucifer. He kept backing up until he was up against the cage wall. Ignoring the searing heat, Michael closed his eyes and leaned his head back. Distantly he heard Lucifer make a half-step towards him, telling him to get away from the wall. It didn’t matter. He could heal his vessel later. Now he needed to think.

The Winchesters had proved to him that their Father’s word wasn’t law. That in and of itself was difficult to deal with. Everything he’d done to Lucifer, everything he’d said to him, had spawned from that idea. From a lie.

And Lucifer. He’d melted Michael’s ring into his heart. Why? Could he possibly still love him after everything? What was with the resentful looks, then? The spiteful words? Why wouldn’t he just tell him-they were safe from all regulation here, after all-unless… Unless he truly thought _Michael_ didn’t love him.

Michael’s eyes snapped open to find Lucifer watching him anxiously a few meters away. Peeling away from the wall, Michael pounced on him. Lucifer’s arms went up defensively before it registered that Michael was kissing him. He froze under the older archangel and Michael pulled back, but stayed above him. He beamed down at his brother, one hand moving up to play with his hair as he waited for a response.

He got confusion.

It wasn’t exactly what he was hoping for, but it was better than animosity.

Before he could answer any of the questions he read in his brother’s eyes, a sharp pain shot through him unlike anything he’d ever experienced and he cried out and collapsed. Lucifer jumped up in an instant, hovering over him with concern.

“What-what’s happening to me?” he forced out trying to look up at his brother. Lucifer looked him over before his face fell in horror, “Michael, your wings…”

Michael twisted around only to stare in shock. His wings were smoldering.

The wall.

Lucifer knelt beside him, reaching out tentatively to run a hand through the feathers that were charred at the edges. Michael flinched but grabbed his wrist to stop him when he tried to pull away, “It’s not that bad. Actually, the cold feels good.They just hurt in general.” Unlike his vessel, wings weren’t simply healed.

The younger seemed unsure, but he continued until he was basically just stroking the other’s wings. Michael relaxed at the touch and eventually the pain numbed a bit. He was practically in Lucifer’s lap now, and it reminded him a lot of that time, so long ago, in one of Heaven’s gardens. Just the two of them.

 

~                                                 ~                                            ~

 

They sat like that for another few centuries. Sam Winchester’s body and later his soul were pulled from the cage. No one was coming for them, or the other boy, Adam Milligan. They didn’t care. 

When the pain had mostly subsided, Michael turned around and kissed him again. This time Lucifer was confident enough to return it. Suddenly the cage wasn’t so bad. At least, it wasn’t lonely anymore.

Then one day, Michael looked at his brother and realized his light had returned. He was bright again. And slowly, ever so slowly, it grew brighter and brighter and the cage began to shift. Lucifer was gaining control over it.

The shifts had unwanted side effects. For example, the archangels found they needed to sleep on occasion, except ‘occasions’ became more and more frequent until they had the same sleep schedule as Adam.

But after a while, the heat left the cage. Then things really started to happen. One day, Michael woke up to find a sky above them. It was a cloudy sky-snowy, even-with more colors than just blue peeking out from behind the clouds. The next day he woke up on an earthy ground. They found a brook the next week. Plants started springing up all over the place.

Then they found the shelter. A grove of trees had grown into the shape of a house-a five room house with a porch. There were two bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a living room.

That one hadn’t been an accident. Lucifer had designed it specifically for them. Grabbing Michael’s hand he pulled him through the woods now sprawling across the cage. He picked him up and flew over the brook, because Michael’s wings were still unable to be used.

“What do you think?” he grinned down at his brother, arm around his waist. Michael studied it all, “It’s perfect, Lucifer. But-” Lucifer’s expression melted from excitement to disappointment in the blink of an eye. Michael laughed, “But why are there two bedrooms?” Lucifer stared at him for a moment before smacking his arm lightly, “Aren’t you forgetting someone?”

“Oh,” Michael replied rather dimly. How had he forgotten his own vessel? Especially since Adam had slowly inched closer to them back when the cage was still hot. He’d ended up sitting in front of the two archangels, because Michael calmed him and Lucifer possessed the coolness he’d approached them for. He still feared Lucifer, but he felt Michael would protect him if the younger ever turned violent. Not that Lucifer’d ever even considered it.

But Adam had left them as soon as the heat did, scurrying back to his corner, afraid of their wrath, or some such thing.

Lucifer smirked at Michael, “If we can convince him we’re safe, he’ll be the closest thing to a son we could ever have.”

The older archangel blinked. Then the full meaning of what Lucifer had said hit and he dragged the other into the house and straight into the larger of the two bedrooms, “Let’s tell him later, shall we?”

 

~                                             ~                                       ~

 

Adam had been _incredibly_ scared to have two archangels looming over him. And then Michael smiled and informed him, “We’ve decided to adopt you.” Adam just kept looking at him, obviously not getting it. Then he noticed that they were holding hands and it clicked that they meant that _very_ literally.

He burst out laughing, “Seriously? Seriously?!”

“Want to see the house?”

They hadn’t waited for an answer, just dragging him along. Slowly he adjusted and they fell into a nice sort of life. Every time somebody wanted something, all Lucifer had to do was concentrate and it would appear quickly, depending on how big it was. They got a library overnight. The television only took an hour. Toast was instantaneous. Things were good.

Years later, Michael and Lucifer were stretched out in bed, arms wrapped around each other, just talking. Adam was out at the bar he’d made Lucifer build for his birthday. There were even people there-important people, according to the archangels. Together, Michael and Lucifer had been able to pull a few souls away from Heaven. Ash, Jo, Ellen, Rufus, and Pamela all had their own places a ways off in the cage. They’d informed Michael and Lucifer that Heaven was in a terrible state at present, but the archangels surprised themselves to find they didn’t particularly care.

Michael carded his fingers through Lucifer’s hair one more time before voicing the question that had been gnawing at his mind for centuries.

“I always meant to ask-how did you get your power back? Your light?”

“You mean how did I become the Morningstar again?”

“Yes.”

“Well, Micha, the ring said it all. I’m _your_ Morningstar.”

**Author's Note:**

> http://singtheskyandfightlikehell.tumblr.com/post/92868341668/i-originally-sketched-this-in-pen-i-like-the
> 
> here you can see a version of the ring Michael gives Lucifer. I do intend to draw better versions & upload them. I'll add the links when I do.
> 
> And somewhere along the way this got a bit Silmarillion. Don't know how that happened. Too much Tolkien today? No, there's no such thing as to much Tolkien.
> 
> Comments & feedback are greatly appreciated.


End file.
